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The English Program is planned to provide growth in reading, composition, and language study, according to the intellectual and social maturity of each student. To varying degrees and at different grade levels, the English program encourages students to appreciate leisure reading by studying important literature which contains ideas important to them and their society; to express themselves in both writing and speaking in an efficient, well-ordered, intelligent manner; and to develop habits of accurate thinking through constant practice and incisive teacher direction.
The study of literature helps the student to develop social and personal attitudes important for the present as well as the future. He/she learns that the ideas reflected in all literature represent an individual's concern with the world as well as the regional community, and that his/her role in life must be a responsible, intelligent, involved, and positive one. In addition to knowing and appreciating specific literary works, the student also develops a better understanding of self through acquaintance with great literary minds and ideas. A primary objective of literature study is to equip the student with the skills and attitudes necessary to make him or her a competent and independent reader and lay critic.
At each grade level, there are three basic anthologies stressing chronological, thematic, and cultural approaches to the literature. The texts, which provide a survey, give students a familiarity with and an understanding of the major movements, literary periods, and influences which shape an important body of literature. However, the intention of each course stresses not literary history but an evaluation of the universally accepted masterpieces of literature, with appropriate in-depth study of those masterpieces which critics, students, and teachers agree best illuminate our involvement with the universal and traditional problems in our society.
In all writing, students are taught to express themselves in clear, effective prose, with specific knowledge of their purpose and a thorough understanding of the skills and techniques essential to various forms of written communication. These skills and techniques include emphasis on mechanics; on the study of the word, the sentence, and the paragraph as structural writing units; and on the process of organizing ideas into themes